Ericsson
Ericsson Power Modules

Digitally controlled and managed power supplies represent a rapidly growing part of the power conversion industry. This highly configurable approach offers a number of advantages over analog-based control methodologies; however, it also creates new challenges in regard to the Quality Assurance (QA) process.

With digital power, converters and regulators are highly configurable via software, resulting in an almost infinite number of possible performance attributes. This raises QA issues such as management of software levels, verification of memory operation internal to power supplies, sourcing of critical digital control components, and failure analysis. This paper describes the efforts of Ericsson, a digital power design company, to develop solutions to these issues; solutions that will be critical to the success of digital power in the telecom and datacom markets.